' The 47th edition of the Biennale Art Exhibition is held in two large areas: the classic Giardini grounds in the district of Castello, and the Corderie dell'Arsenale area, which has by now attained almost equal renown. The Exhibition offers, and implicitly invites comparisons between, the works of three generations of artists - about sixty names from as many nations - whose presence, competition and reciprocal osmosis provide a significant sampling of what is meant by "contemporary art" today, at the end of this century and millenium when the status of the arts themselves has been questioned by the geometrical multiplication of the assault on our hearing and seeing, the production of images has reached such exaggerated proportions as to dismiss the old notion of representationalism, and the multicultural and interdisciplinary plurality of the visual arts seems to impose a radical, if not immediate, departure from the thousand-year history that starts from Pompeian iconography and finishes with the modern breakdown of the realistic mise en cadre.' - Lino Micciche, Chairman of La Biennale di Venezia. This catalogue includes essays on selected artists, all participating countries, and exhibitions with patronage. Also included are artists' biographies.